Polka King Frank Yankovic Dies At 83

NEW PORT RICHEY, Fla. - Frank Yankovic, Grammy-winning "polka king" whose songs wore out thousands of pairs of dancing shoes over six decades, died today. He was 83.

Mr. Yankovic died at home in this Gulf Coast town north of Tampa, said Sunana Batra of Cleveland International Records, his record company. He had suffered a fall last week and was briefly hospitalized, but she said the cause of death was unknown.

Mr. Yankovic had quit performing a year ago because of heart disease.

Mr. Yankovic's accordion mastery wowed audiences of Eastern European ethnicity in his hometown of Cleveland and throughout the Midwest for more than six decades.

"He's the man who put polkas where they are," said Tony Petkovsek, who broadcasts a daily polka show on two Ohio radio stations.

Mr. Yankovic's Grammy nomination for "Songs of the Polka King, Volume 2" in 1998 was his fourth nomination since 1986, when he won the first-ever polka Grammy for "70 Years of Hits."

Mr. Yankovic also recorded recently with Chet Atkins and Don Everly. Mr. Yankovic was perhaps the best-known practitioner of Slovenian polka, which is heavy on accordion, clarinet and saxophone. Polish polka features accordions, trumpets and a faster beat.

"I created a style of Slovenian. The beat that I gave it was different. It was acceptable to teenagers as well as the older folks," Mr. Yankovic said in February. "I took the real old-time polkas and modernized them."

Mr. Yankovic began playing a button accordion when he was 9. His parents got him a piano accordion when he was 15, and he began playing "socials" in Cleveland's ethnic neighborhoods as a teenager.

Mr. Yankovic's two biggest hits were in the 1940s. His signature polka, "Just Because," sold more than 1 million copies in 1948, as did "Blue Skirt Waltz" the next year.

He performed mostly in the Great Lakes area and had TV shows in Cleveland and Chicago in the 1960s.

Among his other hits: "Pennsylvania Polka," "In Heaven There Is No Beer," "Dizzy Day Polka," "Happy Minute Polka," "Accordion Man Waltz," "Champagne Taste and a Beer Bankroll" and his version of the venerable "Beer Barrel Polka."

Mr. Yankovic was married three times and had 10 children, said polka historian Frank Smodic Jr.

Ida Yankovic, Mr. Yankovic's wife, last year said that the reason for his success was simple.

"Frankie played from his heart," she said. "I believe that's why he was put on this Earth, to bring happiness to a lot of people."